Jed Bartlet's advice for Barack Obama

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I was breathless with laughter after reading Maureen Dowd's column earlier this week, which included dialogue she passed along from Aaron Sorkin, who wrote the scripts for The West Wing. Obama asks for advice from the West Wing's fictional president, Jed Bartlet, who said in part, "GET ANGRIER!" More of his response is quoted below:

"GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that's what they are. Sarah Palin
didn't say "thanks but no thanks" to the "Bridge to Nowhere." She just
said "Thanks." You were raised by a single mother on food stamps —
where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get
off calling you an elitist?

And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I'd ask them what their problem is with excellence.

While you're at it, I want the word "patriot" back. McCain can say that the
transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or
he can choose a running mate who doesn't know the Bush doctrine from
the Monroe Doctrine, but he can't do both at the same time and call it
patriotic.

They have to lie — the truth isn't their friend right now. Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they've earned it. McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask
if she was allowed to ban books from a public library. It's not bad
enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years
ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools
to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology,
archaeology and common sense, too? It's not bad enough she's forcing
her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants
the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction, too? It's not
enough that a woman shouldn't have the right to choose, it should be
the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist's
baby, too? I don't know whether or not Gov. Palin has the tenacity of a
pit bull, but I know for sure she's got the qualifications of one. And
you're worried about seeming angry?

You could eat their lunch,
make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call
it restrained. There are times when you are simply required to be
impolite. There are times when condescension is called for! "

The rest of Maureen's column is online at the New York Times.